The present invention is generally related to optical network alarm diagnostics and, more specifically to passive optical network rogue optical network unit diagnostics.
A Passive Optical Network (PON) consists of an Optical Line Termination (OLT), which resides in a Central Office (CO). The optical line termination services a number of Optical Network Units (ONUs) typically connected in a star arrangement using optical splitters, which reside at a premise of a user. Passive optical networks are designed on the premise of time-sharing of resources. The upstream data on the passive optical network sent from the optical network units to the optical line termination is time-multiplexed between the multiple optical network units and is designed to relay data at specified intervals. Problems can arise when ONUs transmit data at times other than their allocated time which may cause data collisions or other errors. If the ONU laser stays on continuously, relays at inappropriate times or does not relay at all problems arise in the network.
The issue that the present invention addresses is to identify rogue optical network units on a passive optical network. A rogue ONU is one that has the capability of disrupting other ONUs on the PON. Currently, there are no known solutions other than manually checking the ONUs on the PON, which is tedious, time consuming and subject to human error.
Therefore what is needed is automated monitoring of ONU behavior on the PON to detect rogue ONUs and more specifically to enable identification of a rogue ONU through the problematic symptoms of other ONUs.